Making Money As A Photographer At iStock
Canon digital cameras are great every which way you look at them. (from all points of view)>>iStockphoto is a very popular stock photography website – with both photographers and buyers. If you′re new to selling your photos at stock photography websites though, it’s usually helpful to find overviews and reviews of various sites available.
iStockphoto is one of the more popular stock agencies online, so I thought it could help to give an overview of my own first impressions of them. When I first started selling my photography at stock photo agencies online a couple of years ago, I didn′t sign up with iStock. I’ve seen websites use photos from that agency in ways they are not suppose to, and that bothered me. I also really didn′t like their upload process and limitations.
After about two years of steady stock photography income growth at other sites though, I finally decided to give in and try iStock. It’s reputed to be a top earning site for many photographers, and the number two earning site for most of the rest. I figured if I was serious about trying to earn my living as a freelance stock photographer, then I should make sure I submitted my images to a place which is often considered to be the top online stock photo agency.
Signing up at iStock is completely free. To start submitting your photography though, you′ll need to do more than just setup an account. The first thing you′ll need to do is apply to become a photographer. This involves taking a brief test, and then submitting your initial photos.
iStock only requires you to submit three images for your “test″. But all three of those pictures must be approved before you′re officially able to start submitting more.
Some photographers feel that the initial test is quite difficult to get three photos approved for, but I personally didn’t have much of a problem. In fact, the only problem I ran into was the fact that I’m primarily a stock food photographer. I submitted two pictures with food and one people photo for my initial test of three, and I quickly found out that iStock prefers to see a variety of topics in your test submission. So even though my photos were not similar in any way, since two of them were on the topic of food one was rejected.
Once I understood they wanted to see 3 different subjects on the first submission, it was quick work for me submit something different and become accepted.
Once you′ve passed your first submission quality review, you can start uploading more of your photos to iStock. And this is the part that I personally detest. iStockphoto doesn′t let you upload your pictures via FTP and they also don′t provide a way to upload more than one photo at a time. You are forced to submit just one picture at a time, and this can be quite painful.
Another restriction that I′m not overly happy about is their upload limits. As a new contributer to iStock, you are only allowed to upload 15 photos in a one week time frame. The time limits are rolling though, and that tends to help, but the restrictions make it impossible to get a decent sized stock photo portfolio built there quickly.
Rolling time frames with the upload restrictions are confusing to many new users too. It’s easy to understand once explained though: The restriction clock starts new with each photo you upload. So if you upload two pictures today and then 13 tomorrow, you’ll have reached your initial 15 upload limit. In roughly 7 days, you will have two upload slots available though – not 15. That’s because you only uploaded two pictures your first day. A day or so after those new slots open, you’ll have another 13 open up though, since you put 13 pictures into the queue the second day.
Speaking of the queue, I’ve found the iStock takes roughly 5-7 days to review pending photos for new contributors. They apparently review photos from exclusive photographers much faster, but you’re not allowed to become an exclusive photographer with them until you’ve reached a specific dollar amount of sales.
Like all online stock photo agencies, iStock likes certain types of photos better than others. So when you first start submitting photos to them you may notice a high rejection rate. After a short while though, you’ll start learning their particular preferences, and you’ll be able to start getting photos approved fairly consistently.
Due to the painful and slow uploading and submission process there though, I have found myself dragging my heels with getting my stock image portfolio onto their site. It took me several months just to get 42 photos online with them, and I only earned a little over twenty dollars in the same timeframe. So I still have quite a ways to go before I can call this site a good earner for me.
Despite these issues, any freelance photographer who wants to sell stock photos online should sign up with iStock. While their system may not be overly friendly to photographers, they do have a very large buyer base that no photographer should ignore.
